ZAM Interview with Richard Knaak

Cody Bye, the Director of Content of ZAM, has just interviewed Richard Knaak, one of the most famous writers of novels and short stories for not only World of Warcraft, but a number of other fictional worlds. Knaak's "Blizzard" bibliography includes novels like Stormrage (the latest official Warcraft novel on the market), 3 standalone Diablo novels, The Sin War series, Warcraft's War of the Ancients trilogy, as well as 2 standalone novels other than Stormrage. In addition to those, he has an impressive number of Dragonlance, Dragonrealm, Conan, individual novels... not to mention his short fiction pieces and the manga.

Sadly, this interview didn't quench my thirst for lore (could anything?), but it was an interesting read nonetheless. The interview is after the break!

ZAM: To start, you’ve written multiple novels in worlds that have already been conceived; known intellectual properties that already have a background. How is writing in the Warcraft lore different than the other properties that you’ve worked on? What are your favorite parts?

The unique thing about Warcraft – and in particular World of Warcraft – is the depth that exists in the lore. It’s larger than almost any other licensed world that I’ve dealt with. They all have some depth, but I can’t think of anything that’s more immense than Warcraft.

So, in that regard, it really feels like you have a history of a world to write about, and it gets more complex and intricate with each passing day. And that’s evident even in the previews that we’ve been releasing lately, there’s just so much there. I’ve worked with Dragonlance, Conan, Beastmaster, and while they all have their own history, nothing compares to this.

There’s always something interesting to see. If you think you know one element of the world, there’s always another aspect going on in the background that remains unseen.

ZAM: Is that more challenging? You have an entire world to choose from when selecting a storyline for your books, rather than a handful of important characters...

Usually, Blizzard will ask me to write about a certain subject or state that they’d like to see a book about a particular element of their setting. They’ll then send me some basic concepts about the story, and then I’ll send my own notions back to them, and at that point we’ll start delving into more details and finally come up with a synopsis based on our trading of ideas. Again, we do some more rounds of brainstorming and eventually we come up with a concept that we all like.

ZAM: With Cataclysm coming out soon – and I know you’re not allowed to talk about future books – but is that exciting from your point-of-view? The world is changing drastically, so it will certainly effect the stories that you write from here on out…

Certainly! There will be so many differences; from the physical world itself to the new character races to alterations in plot direction. They may not be remaking the world, but they’re coming up with something that will give them more avenues to explore while still staying true to Azeroth and its past.

But it’s extremely exciting, I’m already coming up with ideas in my head on how I can write about particular new things that I’ve seen that are coming out of this.

ZAM: Tell us a bit about your most recent World of Warcraft novel, Stormrage. What would you tell someone that knew nothing about the book, but maybe knew a bit about Warcraft?

Stormrage mainly focuses on Malfurion Stormrage, the great archdruid, and what’s been happening with him since we saw him last. One aspect of this is taking a look at where he’s disappeared to and what is going on in the “Emerald Dream,” the realm where the druids go to when they’re in certain forms and is also the realm that the green dragons watch over. The story focuses on this and how what’s going on there affects not only Malfurion but the entirety of Azeroth.

You’ll be seeing a lot of characters that you’ll recognize from the game, along with characters from other books. All of them have to play their part in this story, but the main crux is all about Malfurion and what he has to do to defeat this menace.

ZAM: Does the book touch on Illidan at all?

There is one aspect of that in the novel, but this is really Malfurion’s book. I suspect that Blizzard will want to dedicate a full novel to Illidan if they ever choose to go down that path.

ZAM: Do you actually play World of Warcraft?

I do!

ZAM: So give me some details…

I can’t reveal much, but I will say that I do play more Alliance than Horde, although I do like Tauren. Mages and paladins are some of my favorite classes, and I tend towards Humans and Night Elves for my race. On top of that, I’m also really looking forward to the Worgen when they come out… I’ve always loved werewolves.

I play as much as I can, but I have to finish the books I’m working on and I have to finish the manga as well, so my characters do level up a bit slower than most other players. But I do play as much as I can, and I feel like you really have to play the game to know and understand the world that you’re writing about.

ZAM: What other projects are you working on?

I’ve got a few things, most of which I can’t speak about for one reason or another, but I did just have the first volume of my Dragonrealm series re-released, and those are the books that got me started so that was a nice boon. On top of that, the next three books are getting re-released in the second volume in the set, so hopefully they’ll continue to sell well.

Before the second volume of Dragonrealm is released, you will see two new World of Warcraft mangas released, one will be Warcraft: Mage which explores what it means to be a mage, and the first volume of Warcraft: Shadow Wing (Warcraft: Dragons of Outland) is also coming out soon, and you’ll definitely be seeing a lot of things concerning nether dragons and that sort of thing.

There’s so much that I can’t talk about, and I wish I could!

ZAM: So how’d you get started? Did you originally begin doing licensed books? Or did you have your own published works before you started with licensed books?

Actually, my first finished manuscript was in the Dragonrealm series. I also had a partial of another book done, and I did have some nice bites on them, but not enough to get them sold. But in the meantime, I realized that the people who originally published Dragonlance and D&D, TSR, were located in Lake Geneva, Wisc., and it was only about an hour and a half away. So I drove up there.

I literally walked off the street to talk with them… you can’t really do that anymore. I asked to speak with the editor, and the editor came and took a look at some of the writing samples I’d brought with me. I contacted them after a couple weeks, and although they liked my writing style, they were only publishing Dragonlance novels at the time. So they asked me to submit some ideas for the short story collections that they were going to run in the Dragonlance world, and so I came up with four ideas and they were sold on three out of four of them. I ended up in three out of four of the short story collections and would have had the fourth story in the collections, but they actually asked me to write a novel before I could get to work on the last story.

The rest really just snowballed after that. I’ve now written over 40 novels and a dozen short pieces.

ZAM: Thanks so much for your time, Richard. I hope we can talk again soon!

Comment by nightcrawler93

Comment by Patty

>Mages and paladins are some of my favorite classes, and I tend towards Humans and Night Elves for my race

...does he play a red-head human mage? :<

Mhm. And by night elves, he means wimpy cheerleaders, not the primal elves that the kaldorei actually are.

Comment by bigt78

on 2010-04-27T04:08:49-05:00

If this book is anywhere near as good as his other works then this book will be a great read. I have read his and Goldens works. They are both very talented writers. I am looking forward to reading this.

Comment by Kerstetter

on 2010-04-27T04:59:10-05:00

I liked his Diablo series of books.

Comment by Warluckey1

on 2010-04-28T15:55:50-05:00

Nice interview, Great writer =)Only books by him i´ve read is the War of the Ancients trilogy, but damn, that was the best books i´ve ever read!

Comment by Skreeran

on 2010-04-28T16:26:20-05:00

Nice interview, Great writer =)Only books by him i´ve read is the War of the Ancients trilogy, but damn, that was the best books i´ve ever read!

Really? :\\

I tried reading the first book... Forced myself through 3/4 of it over three weeks or so, and then I borrowed the first Dexter book from the library, and blew through it in two days.

Knaak's not bad, so to speak. I'm sure there are many worse. I mean, I've never had anything published (though I have my aspirations, of course). I just don't enjoy reading his books. They feel so disconnected from the rest of the lore. More new characters are introduced in his books than any other Warcraft books that I've read, for one thing. In addition, those characters are almost always super-special or unique in some way. Brox and his special enchanted wooden axe. Rhonin, the time-travelling mage who can hear night elves walking in his sleep, has a magic liquid metal sword (which appears nowhere else in the lore), and has super-special half-elf twins which are destined for greatness. Lucan Foxblood, the super-special snowflake who happens to be the only human to ever be born in the Emerald Dream, who was saved by Eranikus himself.

In addition, I don't especially like his writing. Descriptions of clothing alone can take a paragraph or two. I rarely connect with any of the characters. When I first heard about Thura in Stormrage, I was excited to hear about another member of the Saurfang family, but she ended up being so flat and boring that I really didn't care if she died by the end of the book. Just another stereotypical ugly, dumb, and smelly orc woman. Not that I would have preferred her being a super-special snowflake, either. There has to be some middle ground.

Another issue, albeit a small one, is chapter length. I'm sure this wouldn't be so much of a problem if reading the books was such an uphill battle, but when I force myself through a 30-40 page chapter (approximately, don't have a book in front of me to check, just going by memory), I don't want to start another one once afterwards.

Maybe it's just me. I don't like Night Elves as they are portrayed in Knaak's books, and I've only read most of the Well of Eternity and Stormrage. I prefer the more vicious way they were portrayed in Warcraft 3. I didn't mind the short bits with Orgrimmar, Undercity and Stormwind in Stormrage. But as much as I love orcs, I expected to like Thura and Brox more than I did, and I found that I just couldn't get into them. It felt like I was reading fan-fiction, rather than real, living lore.

Overall, I just liked Golden's style more. She makes me care about the characters. Arthas wasn't her best work, but even that I finished in just a few days. Her books feel more professional, and more genuine.

So Knaak, if you're reading this (I know I'd read any interview that a website did for me), I really don't mean to be so harsh, I'm just trying to tell it as I see it. I know that you have all your own rationalizations, and I've probably heard a lot of them. I had my own rationalizations when I had my own fan-lore. But, as it turns out, it was still--to use a cliche--mary-sue. It didn't mesh with the existing lore very well, and my main character was way more important, powerful, and unique than any original character should be.

All I ask is that you look at it from a roleplayer's perspective: If it's an existing lore character, it should be played believably and without conflict with the existing lore (like Tyrande's transformation from angry night elf %$#@& in Warcraft 3 to a tender, loving sweetie in War of the Ancients. She got some of her teeth back in Stormrage, but she was still pretty different in Stormrage than she was portrayed in the original material.) Original characters should play a support role, fleshing out the lore, rather than carrying it.

Comment by Rankkor

on 2010-04-29T08:37:51-05:00

ZAM: do you play wow?

Kanaak: I do.

ZAM: can you be a bit more specific?

Kanaak: I do play more alliance than horde

........

no kidding sherlock :P we kinda figured that one out for ourselves.

Comment by Synchronizor

on 2010-04-30T04:53:23-05:00

While I'm a fan of anything featuring Night Elves and druids, there were some issues that made Stormrage somewhat less than enjoyable for me.

One major problem was its pace. The conflict was established quickly, and got going pretty early on. Action in a story isn't a bad thing and Stormrage's pace was cool at first, but the action kept up for almost the entire book, and I started getting burned out about halfway through. The non-stop action also seemed to reduce other important aspects of storytelling, exposition was handled on the fly, and things never seemed to slow down enough for any meaningful character moments or development.

I'm always up for a good action story, but I was also hoping to see cool moments with characters I cared about, or gain some more insight into the culture of my favorite Warcraft race, but apart form a couple brief druid meetings and a few offhand remarks, there was very little of that. Without those elements as a backdrop, the story lacked some "color" for me.

********************Spoiler warning here*****************

The other major problem with the novel was its plot devices. The overall conflict of the novel was an interesting concept, but the way it played out seemed incredibly overdone. The good guys moved against the bad guy, who anticipated their plan and used it for his own purposes. The good guys recover and try again, once more playing into the enemy's hands. Rinse, repeat, etc etc. The characters fought a dragon, moved on, fought another dragon, teleported, fought nightmare apparitions, took a portal, fought another dragon, teleported again, had another fight, flew somewhere else, fought, ported, fought, hearthed, fought, flew, fought, ad nauseam. All the fast-travel devices in the book made the story lack focus, and made it less believable for me.

The biggest plot problem to me was how the conflict was resolved. All through the book, the characters spent so much effort on ventures that seemed to have little to no positive impact on the struggle. Malfurion was freed from the Dream, but the bad guy wanted that to happen. Ysera was captured, and since she was vital to the fight against the Nightmare, the good guys went to great lengths freeing her, only to have her pass out in exhaustion, leaving them back at square one. Only after every long, complex attempt at defeating the enemy had failed to improve the situation did the real solution emerge: Malfurion simply needed to get psyched up enough to defeat the Nightmare with his own druid powers.

I was left wondering what the point of all the battles, all the rescue attempts, all the last-ditch hail-marys were, when all Malfurion had to do from the start was to buck up, get in tune with nature, and mentally kick the Nightmare out of town.

To top it all off, the book ended with Malfurion and Tyrande getting married. Yep, apparently these two have just been boyfriend/girlfriend for the last 10,000 years.

While the ceremony itself was a very nice moment, and was enjoyable in that sense, the sheer absurdity of the idea that these two are only just now tying the knot really pulled me out of the story. In addition, this is the first mention (as far as I know) of any type of Kaldorei marital relationship, but the book failed to provide any real details on how it worked, what it entailed, and so on. The wedding ceremony in the book was obviously an unorthodox example, and as a lore fan, I was disappointed.

********************Spoiler warning ends*****************

In some respects, Stormrage was an interesting read, mostly due to my investment in the Night Elves and the druids, and it provided some long-awaited answers, as well as opened up areas for future stories. The action scenes, while repetitive, were entertaining, and the descriptions of the Nightmare were quite well done. However, it's pacing made it more exhausting than anything, while the shallow character presentation and hard to swallow plot devices really detracted from what I think the novel could have been.

Comment by FarseerLolotea

on 2010-04-30T19:08:59-05:00

Richard Knaak said:Mages and paladins are some of my favorite classes

I am suddenly ashamed that those are my favorites.

Knaak's not bad, so to speak. I'm sure there are many worse. I mean, I've never had anything published (though I have my aspirations, of course). I just don't enjoy reading his books. They feel so disconnected from the rest of the lore.

Indeed, but you might want to avoid saying that on the awful forums.

Knaak is the average media tie-in author. Which is to say, he writes licensed fanfics. And in his case, it's obvious.

same herechristie golden is reall good

As media tie-in authors go, she's good.

As novelists in general go? I've managed to acquire and read some of her original works. She's okay, but she's certainly no Margaret Atwood or Vonda N. McIntyre.

Even so, I'd rather read her work than Knaak's any day.

Comment by Rankkor

on 2010-05-07T10:43:40-05:00

favorite authoress Agatha Christie....

is hard for me to find a better one :P

Comment by denjerre

on 2010-05-07T10:51:33-05:00

favorite authoress Agatha Christie....

is hard for me to find a better one :P

I have found my soulmate.

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